Google And Viacom Settle Once And For All

Google and Viacom have finally settled their lengthy legal battle over copyright once and for all. The companies both announced the news Tuesday morning.

Here’s their joint statement: “Google and Viacom today jointly announced the resolution of the Viacom vs. YouTube copyright litigation. This settlement reflects the growing collaborative dialogue between our two companies on important opportunities, and we look forward to working more closely together.”

Terms of the settlement were not disclosed.

The two companies have been battling for a long seven years. In 2007 (the year after Google acquired it), Viacom sued YouTube for $1 billion claiming “massive intentional copyright infringement”. Viacom alleged that YouTube contained roughly 160,000 infringing videos, which had then accumulated over a billion and a half views.

The battle raged on for years. In 2010, it looked like Google was victorious. Google even claimed a victory on its blog, as the court granted its motion for summary judgment, deciding YouTube is protected by safe harbor of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA).

Obviously Viacom continued to fight, and last year, YouTube scored another victory when a federal court rejected Viacom’s suit. Google called that an “important day for the Internet” (twice in the same announcement).